Men's, Women's Speech Patterns Develop Early

November 13, 1989|By MARK DI VINCENZO Staff Writer

WILLIAMSBURG — Boys and girls learn how to say what they say in sandboxes, playgrounds, clubhouses and tree forts.

Most often, the boys become men who speak assertively, and the girls become women who speak passively, says Deborah Cameron, a sociolinguist at The College of William and Mary who co-wrote a book on women and their speech patterns.

Although Cameron studies what people say, she specializes in how they say it and the "strategies they use," with the hope that a better understanding will make it easier to teach men and women the importance of using a "common language."

A world with less assertive speech, she says, might be less confrontational and produce less stress.

Researchers have found that the stereotype that women are gabby is inaccurate and that when men and women are together, men often dominate conversations and interupt more often than women.

Cameron says people develop their speaking skills soon after they learn to speak, when they begin spending time with their peers.

Boys tend to play in large groups, and leaders emerge, as do followers. They know their place in the group, and if the followers don't speak assertively, they at least see how it's done, and most use that knowledge when they become adults.

Girls, however, tend to play in smaller groups where they must avoid conflicts or risk being alienated from their friends.

The differences between how men and women talk is often most obvious when they ask others to perform tasks.

"Men will say, `Do this or do that ...,'" she says. "Women will say, `Let's do this or that.' They're doing the same thing - they're giving directives - but in a different way."

Largely because of the changing business world, which accepts more women these days, many women have changed how they talk, becoming more assertive.

Getting men to change, however, is expected to be more difficult, if not impossible.

"They feel that they have been served pretty well by the system and can't see the advantages as far as dollars and cents," Cameron says. "It's a shame that men can't see they have more to gain by speaking in a more interpersonal way because they are laboring under disadvantages when it comes to language."

She says most men lack a same-sex "support group" they can turn to when they have personal problems. What's more, they are hesitant to develop a group like that because of the need to be "strong and silent" types and because of the fear that their heterosexuality will be questioned.

These attitudes probably influence what people say, linguists have found, and the findings are quite predictable. Men tend to talk about "things," like sports and cars, and women tend to talk about people and relationships.